Celtics Hold On - Up 2-0

David Copperfield would be envious of that escape.

Celtics did not deserve to win that game.

Can’t even believe that we held on.

The way the C’s relaxed in that 4th quarter was inexcusable.

Two nice things though:

1.The Celtics learned an important lesson about the explosiveness of the Lakers offense without having to lose a game.

2. Now all the media hype will be about how sick the Lakers offense is instead of the Celtics defense so the C’s should have plenty of bulletin board material on their way to LA even though they’re up 2-0.

“They’re up 2-0”

still doesn’t seem possible

lol @ “Celtics did not deserve to win that game.”

So now Phil Jackson has gone up against Doc Rivers 4x this year and come up short on all four occasions. I wonder what spin Bill Simmons is gonna put on this one.

Here is the spin he will use: Tom Thibodeau

Jeff,
I absolutely agree about Phil Jackson. How is it he can get away with that? I thought the NBA fined coaches for being openly critical of the refereeing. How about the 3 step lay up toward the end of the game?

I sure pine for the old days when the immediately preceding play was replayed before a free throw. Have you noticed they never replay fouls. NBA policy I’ll bet.

Also liked hearing Doc say that they are not posting up enough. I’m starting to like that guy more. ESPN’s so-called analyst Michael Wilborn is an *, doesn’t have a clue.

first of all, omg at that Radman travel not getting called. But at the same time it’s not like the Cs “deserved” those two points.

Here’s the thing: this is the third effing time this has happened. We get up huge. We play undisciplined offense, and more damning, we played lazy defense. I mean Fisher, Machine, Radman… they just had wide open spot up threes.

Firstly this is on the players. But what does Doc need to do to get this to STOP happening? Call a TO earlier? When we’re up 11 instead of up 6? I mean.. this got wayyyy too close. It was within 2 points.

. ESPN’s so-called analyst Michael Wilborn is an *, doesn’t have a clue.

he’s one of the most clueless sports journalists there is, across ALL sports. He’s a boob. But I still love PTI:)

I hate it when people just look at the free throw disparity and complain, unless you can point out to specific calls then don’t bring that weak stuff in here

Gentlemen, how are you this evening? I’m here from Forum Blue and Gold (the Lakers blog run by Kurt, in case you’ve forgotten). Congratulations on going up 2-0 in the series.

I hope you won’t think this sour grapes, as I’m genuinely curious as to your interpretation of the officiating in the game? Clearly Radmanovic’s uncalled travel was blatant, to say the least, but it was nevertheless one play over the course of a game that seemed to favor Boston at least to some degree. Home court advantage, one might think?

I come to ask this because I’d like your responses to this bit of information: at least according to Sportsline.com’s shot tracker (http://www.sportsline.com/nba/gamecenter/shotchart/NBA_20080608_LAL@BOS – pick “all shots” from the pulldown menu for each team), the Lakers had far more shot attempts in the paint than the Celtics, yet were well behind in the free throw count. The Celtics shot 18 lay-ups and dunks, while the Lakers shot 30 of the same. This would seem to nullify the “aggression” argument, would it not? And it wasn’t just the end of the game – for one, LA shot itself back in via the 3, not plays in the paint. For two, the discrepancy was 22 to 12 in favor of LA at halftime.

I want to be clear that at the end of the day, the W is all that matters, and Boston now has 2. But I was hoping to get an understanding of your point of view, given the heavy disparity in FT attempts ( 28 to the Celtics) yet the lack of evidence suggesting that Boston was more aggressive or attempted more shots at the rim.

Either way, good luck on Tuesday. Hopefully we can turn this thing around in Staples.

Does the shot tracker show shots that were missed due to fouls?

If not (and they are certainly not included in field goal attempts on box scores), then it makes perfect sense. The Cs were fouled in the paint a lot and hence missed the unreported shots. The Lakers were fouled less and hence their missed shots are counted and so they have more FGAs. In other words, the two facts are not contradictory; they are almost two different ways of saying the same thing.

Bottom line: C’s == good defense.

I do think the officiating in the first half was bad. Cs got a lot of 50/50 calls that Lakers weren’t getting. Refs also completely missed Gasol get hacked on that alley oop score. I also thought Turiaf’s block on Powe was totally clean. All the other trips Powe took to the line, however, were legit in my opinion.

The free throw discrepancy doesn’t explain it, though. Frankly, under, the Lakers interior defense is pathetic. Truly awful. Perk, KG, PJ, Paul.. they all play to contest shots, go straight up, get in good position, etc. Gasol, on the other hand, is often out of position. Odom is captain Lazy and always reaches. I mean, Leon kept catching the ball 2-feet from the hoop with daylight. As a result the Lakers reached and grabbed a ton.

If I were a Lakers fan, I’d be way more concerned about Gasol only getting 12 shots this game. He’s your best offensive player this game by far. I think he only had 11 shots in game 1. Ridiculous.

To Underbruin: I think the officiating favored the Celtics, and we were gifted some calls but I don’t think that was ultimately what determined the outcome of the game.

The Celtics didn’t deserve to lose that game, celticsmaniac. They deserved to win after dominating the game until the 2:30 minute mark. I’m still sick that that happened, but come on. They deserved to win that game because of their play for most of the game. Did they fall apart in the end? Yes, but that doesn’t mean they derserve to lose.

Well..I thought one of the refs didn’t really care for Kobe. But he has reaped that with his whiny play during the season..

I think the hidden factor that no mainstream media REALLY wants to touch is the physical athletic african american play of the C’s vs. the European finesse style that the Lakers use. The Lakers probably would spank the C’s in FIBA ball but in the NBA so far at least they seem overmatched.

Guys like Powe, Perkins, PJ, Pierce just BULLY the physically weak Lakers. As such they are going to get to the line more. The only guy on the whole team who physically matches up with Powe is Turiaf who frankly isn’t very talented.. This is the factor the C’s have to exploit and so far they have done a decent job.

I also should mention, even disregarding the egregious Radman travel, there were some ticky tack fouls on the Cetlics in the second half.. Rondo’s “hook”, touch foul on Rondo to Kobe, touch foul on Pierce guarding Kobe off the ball, etc.

cmoney – Well, I don’t agree that Gasol’s a better offensive player than Bryant. 30 points on 23 shots is actually pretty good offensive efficiency. His points-per-shot against SAS was 1.22, and tonight was 1.30, so he was able to get his points more effectively tonight than he was against the Spurs. For context, 1.3 pps is how efficiently he scored in his much-lauded Game 5 performance to close the Spurs out. I do agree that they went away from Gasol inexplicably – he started off extremely well, and then they stopped giving him the ball. Same thing has happened in other games this postseason, and I’m not totally sure why.

manbefree – A very good point, and one I had admittedly considered but omitted for the purposes of rhetoric (a ha! the disingenuous Lakers fan raises his head). Nevertheless, even if we were to assume that EVERY Celtics set of free throws was a 2-shot foul in the paint that didn’t count towards FGA (an unlikely proposition to say the least), that’s still only 19 more shots added in the paint. And then, even if we assume the Lakers had ZERO 2-shot fouls in the paint, the Celtics still only would have 7 total more shots (18 19 = 37 vs LA’s 30) in the paint than the Lakers, using the most preferential mathematics POSSIBLE towards the Cs. Given that, using the most extreme math possible, the difference in lay-ups/dunks is still fairly small (less than 25%), isn’t the free throw disparity still rather striking, and at least a tad confusing?

I will note, I agree with cmoney’s contention that most of Powe’s FTA in the 1st half were valid, and that he picked an awfully good time to have a great game (I’m a Pac-10 basketball fan, and I’ve actually always liked Powe, so tonight was a rough night for me to see him kill the Lakers this way). Still, even taking out every last one of Powe’s FTAs, the Celts still shoot 13 more free throws (with Lamar Odom and Pau Gasol combining for 1 free-throw attempt between the two of them despite 16 combined lay-up/dunk attempts).

Either way, again, congrats on the victory. All of this discourse is purely academic, and all the arguing in the world couldn’t change that ‘L’ in the Lakers’ column tonight, but thanks for engaging me nonetheless.

Yeah I don’t pay too much to the officiating that’s the league and lead officials job. Its nice to know that if you play the Lakers soft, they will burn you especially from 3 point land. Lakers just ran out of time and the wrong player took the shot at the end of the game. I don’t know why Rondo is in the game in this situation. House would have been far better to stop the run. Anyway Doc will have plenty to motivate this team for Game 3.

Oh, and please allow me to clarify and note that I agree with your sentiments that the officiating didn’t decide the game. If the game isn’t a huge blowout late in the 4th, the Celtics don’t let up and the Lakers don’t start bombing away from 3, so to simply point at the close finish and go “ook ook 28 free throw differential” is to ignore the ebb and flow of every basketball game. The Celtics played like the better team tonight, and the Lakers caught fire with just enough time left to very nearly steal one even so. The better team won, I believe. So don’t let my questions re: fouls/etc point to anything less than that, please, because that’s not my intention.

Here is the bottom line. Just because you shoot from the paint doesn’t mean you should get 2 free throws. The Celtics played solid defense. The Lakers played WNBA defense, lots and lots of slapping. Did the refs miss some calls? Yes, but not THAT many. The foul difference wasn’t huge, it was free throws, and that is because one team was hacking on the shot, and one team wasn’t.

celticsmaniac said:

Celtics did not deserve to win that game. Can’t even believe that we held on.[/quote]

One bad quater does not decide a basketball game. And the fact that they held on shows that they are getting seasoned. For their own sake though, I hope the Celtics stop playing the score instead of the game, but they absolutely deserve this win.

As Karim intimated during the post-game show, the Celtics have never had this kind of experience protecting large leads while playing at such a high level. You do that against teams like the Lakers, and it could cost you as the Spurs learned. But here’s what should put a smile on Celtics fans faces… The team held their ground under pressure. They played composed basketball when they could have crumbled easily. I really have no complaints about the way this team Celtics is playing right now.
**************

CelticsGM said:
[quote]Did they fall apart in the end? Yes, but that doesn’t mean they derserve to lose.

Not to nitpick, but while they let their guard down, they certainly did not fall apart in the end; their lead was cut to 2, and yet they fought back to win by 6. That certainly does not qualify as falling apart in the end. This Lakers team cannot match the Celtics defensively. That’s just the reality of the situation. Memo to the Lakers… The Celtics are NOT the Spurs.

LastTrain – I both do and don’t agree. I do agree that the Celtics play much better defense in the paint than the Lakers, and as such it’s unsurprising that they would get MORE free throws. What I don’t agree with is claims that the Lakers were doing nothing but jump-shots – and generally in NBA games, play in the paint is rewarded to some degree with free throws almost regardless of defense.

Aditionally, let’s not pretend that the Celtics have a track record of avoiding fouls like the Spurs do. The Celts were 21st in the league in free-throws allowed (in other words, gave up more FTAs than 20 other teams), despite playing at a pace below the league average (19th in the NBA). The Spurs are #2 in the league. My question really doesn’t have anything to do with Boston getting 38 attempts – like I said, I think most of them were earned (obviously not all, but I don’t think EVERY free throw attempt is earned in pretty much any NBA game by any NBA team). My surprise is at the low number allotted to the Lakers.

That having been said, The Village Idiot is right. In many ways, it might have been better for the Lakers to lose the game by double-digits (maybe 12-15, getting a mini-run at the end to get some of their confidence back). I think it’s VERY unlikely that the Celtics will go to Staples with a relaxed attitude (which is I think one of the major reasons they struggled with the Hawks), given that they almost let the lead in this game slip away.

Well, like I said – the refs obviously missed some calls, but there would have still been a huge difference in the FTs because of the Lakers lazy defense. The Lakers should have gotten 6 or 8 more free throws, I agree with that. But the fouls weren’t as different as the FT difference would make you believe, and I think that is because when it came down to it, the Celtics didn’t foul as much in the act of shooting.

As far as the Lakers being better off having lost by more points. I understand your point, but I’d have to disagree – I think had the Celtics won by 20-25, Kobe was on the verge of becoming “bad” Kobe and not trusting his teammates, which would be the worst possible thing for them right now. I think by making a game of it the Lakers may have dodged that bullet.

Last Train – Well, you may be right. Though, considering some of the games he’s had in the playoffs in the past, “bad” Kobe might be exactly what LA needs in game 3 to right the ship. Lamar Odom has been totally taken out of his game by the Cs, and Vlad Radmanovic has always been a space case. See the latter part of the 3rd quarter, when the Lakers made a mini-run to get to within 9 with Kobe finally getting some penetration and finding his teammates. The Lakers get the ball, and Radmanovic launches a contested 3 with plenty of time on the shot-clock that clangs off the rim. Rondo boards, dribbles, eventually finds Pierce who hits a runner in the lane – back up to double digits. Next possession, Vlad decides to dribble-drive and throws the ball to KG (who isn’t within 5 feet of another Laker – Gasol was at the top of the key, outside his range). Pierce gets a lay-up, the lead’s back up to 13, and Kobe gets pissed. In the next minute, he takes 2 straight bad shots and throws a pass straight to Rondo. The Lakers have a 4-plus minute scoreless stretch, and the Cs go into the 4th leading by 22. Honestly, that’s the sequence that nailed down the game for you (ending notwithstanding – it really kind of has to be looked at almost as its own segment of the game, separate from everything else). One wonders what happens if Kobe demands another couple shots in that situation, instead of letting VladRad do his “thing.”

I do agree to a degree on the FTs – I think the Cs would have had a big advantage (though I think the number should have been closer to 10 or 15 than 20-plus – so sue me, I’m a Lakers fan, heh). The problem I do have though is that much of LA’s early fouls weren’t, in fact, on the shot. They were fouls on the floor. Both of Kobe’s quick 2 as well as his 3rd during the 2nd quarter were not shooting fouls (or free throw fouls), but forced him to sit long stretches, during which LA’s bench got killed by Boston’s starters (and Powe, of course). The Lakers committed 8 fouls in the first period – only 2 of them were on the shot. It was in the second quarter that the Celtics got primarily shooting fouls. In part that’s on LA’s bench, but in part that’s because they were sagging off more on defense to avoid getting called for the chippies – which led to dribble-penetration and easy looks in the paint.

In specific instances I’m sure it would be better for Kobe to be bad Kobe and take the shot. But not in the long run. You aren’t going to beat the Celtics without a lot of ball movement. And you aren’t going to have that if Kobe decides to do everything by himself. He can’t beat the Celtics 1 on 5. Some teams? Yes. Not this one.

TWW – I agree that Kobe wasn’t aggressive enough. I noted my fears to this effect over on FB&G before Game 1 – he fell in love with his jumper against the Spurs, because he was hot all series long. Look at his shot charts versus San Antonio – they look remarkably similar to games 1 and 2. To be honest, like I said above, he was actually pretty darn efficient tonight – 48% shooting on 23 shots, 30 points, 7/7 from the free throw line (1.3 points per shot, actually more efficient than against the Spurs).

Kobe wasn’t the problem tonight – his teammates (and the Lakers defense in general, really) were. Gasol and Odom received one free throw between them for 16 shots. That’s partially due to what you’re talking about – Gasol in particular generally fails to go up strong. But usually simple presence in the paint will equate to some free throw opportunities, and those just didn’t materialize. The Lakers had seventeen shooting fouls called against them. The Celtics had three. It seems unlikely to me that, given LA’s presence in the paint (relatively soft or not) that a lack of calls doesn’t fall to some degree on the zebras.

Having said all that, more and more as I look at it I think it’s a combination of simple home court effect (which exists everywhere in the league), a bit of soft play by LA (matador defense on Leon the bull – TORO!), and really just a handful of calls that went against the Lakers on each end. It seems magnified due to the eventual free-throw disparity. This game was won by the defense and (very) timely shooting of the Celtics (9-14 from 3 is going to win you a lot of games no matter what the free-throws are). The free throws just give us something to complain about, I suppose – and perhaps a hope that we’ll have better luck on the home floor.

The point about PJ Brown is a good one, and one I hadn’t considered – though his ‘fouls/36 minutes’ on the season is a pretty terrible 5.0. For comparison, that’s worse than everybody on the Celtics except Pollard, Big Baby, and Powe, the latter two being similar at 6.1 and 5.7 respectively (more proof that KG is awesome: he’s at only 2.5, despite anchoring the middle… that’s really, really low, despite his excellent D and shotblocking prowess). Even so, given his veteran status and the fact that this is the playoffs, I imagine he’s probably got a few tricks up his sleeve to avoid the whistle down the stretch. Basketball-reference.com and 82games.com are always your friend for stats, in case you’re wondering where these numbers are coming from (despite the temptation, I refrain from simply inventing numbers).

Sorry if one of our other regulars has been a bit more… shall we say confrontational than I have. I have no great love for the Celtics, but I fail to understand why fans can’t respect each other – and I might also add that you guys have been nothing but great the couple of times I’ve stopped by. Good point on the ‘Lakers in 5’ comment – I’ll admit that I suggested something similar, though I at least offered the caveat that if LA failed to get one of the first two they weren’t going to win the series (I know, going out on a limb there). Whether or not the teams prove me wrong, I know we can all appreciate and hope for some great basketball for the remaining games (hopefully at least 6).

Last Train – Good point. You’re right, the Celtics are much too good defensively for LA to win with ‘bad Kobe.’ I suppose those series against the Suns skewed my perceptions… But they’re the SUNS – just a liiiiiiittle bit better defense at TD Banknorth, or so I’ve heard.

honestly, underbruin, I think the league was terrified that the Lakers would make this a short series and wanted to give the Celts a little boost. I don’t believe that the NBA fixes games or even that they necessarily could if they wanted to, but the refs defintly gave the C’s a little boost

BTW – I expect this trend to reverse immediatly upon tip-off in LA. Kobe has alwasy tended to get the calls in his career and there’s no reason to expect that to change now

Well, I don’t agree that Gasol’s a better offensive player than Bryant. 30 points on 23 shots is actually pretty good offensive efficiency

I don’t really mean better in and of itself, but within the triangle and given the matchups, Gasol should be getting a huge amount of touches. The Lakers offense is at its best running through Gasol. It opens things up a lot more for Kobe and for guys like Sasha and 4-steps Radman. He should be taking ~20 shots per game, maybe 25. 12 is a joke for a post presence of his magnitude.

The Lakers played WNBA defense, lots and lots of slapping.

she wouldn’t say that

TWW – 82games.com has postseason stats for the teams. According to this page: http://www.82games.com/0708/playoffs/0708BOS3.HTM

The C’s have given up just shy of 30 FTAs per game in the playoffs. Of course, that counts all the fouls committed on ‘road’ games, when the officiating would be likely to be biased in favor of the opponent.

celticsmaniac – Why so down on your team, when up 2-0? Boston has looked like the better team in this series for 90 minutes, with only the last 6 or so suggesting otherwise (and again, that’s really more of an outlier than anything else, I’d think). Trust me, they haven’t needed, and don’t need, any boost to beat LA. They just need to keep playing well, though, which isn’t a guarantee in Staples, where pretty much every opponent has looked significantly more beatable. Then again, the Celtics won 66 games for a reason. Should be a fun few games.

Also, maybe worth mentioning that late acquisition P.J. Brown is far less foul prone than the C’s young 4/5s, so it’s possible the Celtics regular season FTs allowed # is misleading now.

interesting theory. I may look into this later. I do know during the regular season that PJ was sort of a foul machine.. not quite as bad as Powe or Baby (5.4 and 6.1 PF/36mins,respectively), but pretty bad (5 PF/36min). Maybe some of that was rust, but he also averaged 4.6/36min in his full previous year. The truth is probably somewhere in between.. he’s clearly in better playing shape now, but he’s not exactly hiding his age either. He’s also getting more minutes in the post-season alongside KG, which should help him focus more on solid D rather than having to prevent a layup.

OK guess I’m doing all the work now rather than later. According to ESPN, PJ is averaging 8.3PF/48min, which translates to 6.2/36min. So yeah none of this debate really holds any water. I’m just thankful he’s playing much, much better this series than against Detroit where he was just awful. He was in my doghouse big time.

Okay guys, a few comments and then I’m off. I want to again thank you for the really intelligent comments – you’ve got a great community here, and you should be really proud of it and yourselves (… man, that comes off as far more patronizing than I would like it to – but the sentiment is honest, some really good discussion over here).

1st, 10 points to cmoney for “she wouldn’t say that.” … Make it 20. LOL, and all that other nonsense you kids use nowadays.

2nd, fair point on Gasol – I really can’t figure out why he seems to disappear right as it looks like he’s about to get going. Maybe it’s that soft, nougaty European-ness coming to the fore? Though I might argue, if I were still hooked on the fouls, that he might have stopped shooting because he felt he wasn’t getting any calls. Soft that is, but it’s at least a slightly more acceptable excuse than “KG scares me and I fully expect him to send my next ‘weenie’ shot into the 34th row” – which is also probably true to some degree. The officiating definitely seemed to take him out of his game – he was something like 5-for-5 in the early going, and went 3-for-7 the rest of the way. That’s at least partially on the Lakers, who have tended at times this year to get caught up in the officiating (the most egregious example being Farmar complaining about a non-call while the Celtics got a 3-on-1 and Pierce, I believe, hit a trailing 3). I do expect more calls to go his (and Lamar’s) way in LA, though. Will it be enough? We’ll see.

Lastly, I do think PJ Brown makes a difference when he can avoid going overboard with the fouls. He’s got about 44 minutes so far in this series, with 4 fouls. In game 1 he had 3 fouls in 21 minutes (which is right about his season average of 5 per 36). Tonight he had 1 in just under 23 mins – if he can stay at that level, he’ll provide a MAJOR lift to the Celtics. As good as Powe was tonight, his plus-minus was only positive 2. Brown’s was a positive TEN – tied with Pierce, one behind Ray Allen (who led the Celtics). Obviously, “lies, damn lies, and statistics” caveats apply, but I’m not surprised that when he was able to play and avoid fouling, the Celtics had a lot of success.

Okay guys, that’s it for me. Thanks again – see y’all on Tuesday.

Underbruin, I just went to the lakers board and the way your fans are reacting to the officiating is pretty shameless. I have to say, I too agree the calls went in favor of the Cs, but it was not why the Cs won the game.

The fact that people on your board are calling the refs the “Big Three” is just really pathetic. They can try to dismiss the Cs, but our team is no worse than yours and people need to recognize that. I hope for the Lakers sake that they don’t adopt the mindframe of the Lakers board or they’ll psyche themselves out and won’t make the adjustments they need to make on Defense and Offense.

Regarding the game:
I know people have mentioned the Lakers D and Gasol, so I’ll just say I agree on what’s been said about that. But one more thing that I have to say is that the ball movement of LA was pretty bad, especially comparing to the Cs. The assist number back it up, but I think even just watching you could tell that the Celtics were getting a lot of easy baskets (and wide open 3s) from the way they were moving the ball.

The last few minutes of the 4th were exactly the opposite, lots of open 3s for the Lakers and lazy D by the Cs. You’d think there’d be more discussion about that on the board but people just seem to be either getting ready to jump of a bridge or just ref bashing. Are Lakers fans really that bad? Besides you (since you seem to be rational and educated) so far I have a pretty bad impression of your fans.

to the lakers fan who questions disparity of ft attempts. suck it up. finesse play always gets crushed by aggressive and rugged plays down low. accept it. the likes of powe, pj brown, pierce gets all the calls simply by attacking the hoop and baiting the defender for contact, which simply equals fouls. kinda common sense. if you play soft, like jumpshooting and avoiding contact inside the paint, then you definitely don’t deserve any call… simple.

so for the c’s to continue to win, just attack the paint! the lakers aren’t as good interior defenders as the hawks, cavs and especially the pistons…

way too muchb talk about the officiating and not enough about the celtics’ aggressiveness, which won the game. the c’s also let down with the big lead and couldn’t get the handle back unti pp stepped up. so far, the c’s are the best team easily. that could change in la but maybe the letdown will keep the coaches and players honest going into the next game.

I don’t think we are going to pity any team, let alone the Lakers, after going through what we went through with Atlanta. We are “Atlanta-ing” the Lakers with agressive play and are being rewarded, just as they were. The more agressive team gets the spoils.

TWW – 82games.com has postseason stats for the teams. According to this page: http://www.82games.com/0708/playoffs/0708BOS3.HTM

The C’s have given up just shy of 30 FTAs per game in the playoffs. Of course, that counts all the fouls committed on ‘road’ games, when the officiating would be likely to be biased in favor of the opponent.

Which is why I said last night it’s about damned time the C’s got some home court cooking.
That was the first game in the entire playoffs that I could say that while the C’s have had to put up with it constantly, particularly Atlanta and Cleveland.

The Celtics have been able to rise above it. The fact that they have homecourt because of their hard work during the regular season is beginning to show it’s importance.
And to any LA fan that wants to pin the Celtics record on the fact that they played in the EC, check out the Celtics record against the West. It’s acutally better.